Edmond O'Brien and Frank Lovejoy pick up a hitch-hiker (William Talman) who turns out to be an insane escaped convict.

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This movie is part of the collection: Film Noir

Director: Ida Lupino
Production Company: Filmakers, The
Audio/Visual: sound, black and white
Keywords: suspense; terror; hitch-hiker; murder; convict

Creative Commons license: Public Domain

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Reviewer: slurryer - - November 27, 2011
Subject: Not Great But Definitely A Good Movie
I liked this. It wasn't great, but good. By the final scene at the water front, I was really expecting the good guy to get it. Nice twist. Somewhat predictable, but nicely done.

Reviewer: NoSpillBlood - - November 11, 2011
Subject: A good film for any time, actually.
Thanks for the upload.

This film frankly and powerfully demonstrates the fact that the world isn't a superhero comic or Rambo. People can mess with you -- with anyone reading this -- and get away with it under the right circumstances. That's where the power of The Hitchhiker comes from, as stated in the films prologue title. Perhaps it took a woman to direct a film that deals honestly with this in it's time. No macho would-be heroics here, just emotional, psychological truth.

Reviewer: MalcolmL - - October 26, 2011
Subject: Good
The film is good for it's time

Reviewer: jeffzkrazie - - October 7, 2011
Subject: Awesome Movie!
Great Noir!

Reviewer: admario - - June 12, 2011
Subject: The good old movies!
Great movie, with that sense of what really takes to get you stuck to the screen! Great performances, too.

Reviewer: Kodachrome - - November 28, 2010
Subject: I thought the plot was dull.
The acting was fine, but the story was not plausible and I could not identify with the characters.

Perhaps it is because I find the whole "victim mentality" to be abhorrent, but in my world, I would have mocked the villain at the first stop and told him that he didn't have the testicular fortitude to kill me.

I won't be watching this film again.

I hate to give one star just because the story stunk, so I'll give it two.

Reviewer: danielps2fan - - September 30, 2010
Subject: Cinematography by Nicholas Musuraca
Val Lewton fans should watch this movie if only to see the brilliant Nicholas Musuraca cinematography.

Musuraca who worked on Lewtons Cat People(1942),The Seventh Victim(1943)and The Ghost Ship(1943)now uses his skills in broad daylight and on location, something he seldom did on his films with Lewton.

Reviewer: Elric_Dewisant - - September 20, 2010
Subject: Holy crow! Hamilton Burger can act!!
Here in Portland OR, Perry Mason consistently beats out the local noon news in the ratings. Honestly, I'm bored of it. Day in and day out, most performances are phoned in, Burger always loses and is forever arrogant, bumbling and incompetent.

Not here, Lupino is in fine form as a director, and William Talman does a decent job of acting, though his character is still a loser...a very nasty, loser. Lupino and Young really did their homework, basing the events of the film on the real-life crime spree of Billy Cook. Though some facts were changed, Emmett Myers is Billy Cook, right down to the deformed eye. The tension and pacing are great. It's pretty brightly lit for noir, but what matters is how bleak the atmosphere is. It's not exactly dark in the desert, though the interiors tend to be darkly lit. The piece is just about as bleak as you can get. All in all, with the print quality and sound being absolutely superb, this is a highly overlooked, under-rated gem of a film and worth seeing.

Reviewer: keygrip - - August 30, 2009
Subject: A milestone
This is an edge of the seat crime drama (though not my idea of film noir) from ground breaking director/producer Ida Lupino,featuring three stalwarts of the 50's. Special mention to the excellent William Talman who gave a great study in evil.
The film has not dated and stands up to anything made today in a similar vein.
One to treasure

Reviewer: jmcorry1 - - April 5, 2009
Subject: Great!
Definitely worth a watch. Even though it was predictable at times... even cheesy, it was good, honest entertainment and quite suspenseful with good acting to boot.

Reviewer: j_james - - June 15, 2008
Subject: Hitchhiker review
I've seen a few hitch-hiker movies lately. The hitcher, both the Rutger Hauer classic and the fairly recent remake. I like this one better. It made for a good lazy Sunday afternoon feature with plenty of suspense and believable actors, even though in one or two places, he plot itself unfolds in either predictable ways or temporarily lifts the veil of illusion. I give it a solid four stars.

Reviewer: flickfdude - - April 27, 2008
Subject: couldn't download the mpeg
But the FLV on the FTP page downloaded. It was a good movie.
The bad rating is because it wasn't very good resolution.